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Force Quit, Restart? Apple Scrapes New Retail Building on Site of Planned Highland Village Store

Maybe that spec retail block at the Highland Village Shopping Center wasn’t good enough for Apple, after all. A couple of readers have written in to report that the never-been-occupied eastern portion of the relatively recent building at 4012-4018 Westheimer — where Houston’s first-ever mall-free Apple Store is supposed to go — has been torn down completely. The foundation and portions of the parking lot have been jack-hammered, writes one reader: “It’s like someone took a big pair of scissors and cut it off, through the beams, etc. The rest of the structure that houses Sprinkles, Paper Source, and what will be Restoration Hardware is still there. But the end where the Apple Store is/was going to be is gone.”

A permit for the “partial” demo of the building at 4012 Westheimer appeared on Swamplot’s Daily Demolition Report back on Valentine’s Day. An Apple retail fan site notes that according to its sources the Highland Village store when it opens “will bear some resemblance to the Scottsdale Quarter store.” Which looks like this:

Isn’t that kinda insane in the membrane that a profit can still be made after tearing down a steel-beamed 2-story shell and then rebuilding with high-end finishes (I was told the new store was going to be “all glass”)?

The first building was Apple istore 1.0. Like everything else from Apple, istore 1.0 has been updated and replaced with the Apple istore 2.0. Thus, Apple was forced to demolish the first building to make way for the next gen store.

I think the 2.0 istore is just a little thinner than the 1.0, but can hold more ipads. Not sure how that works, but that is the genius of Apple.

I hope my dreams of a non-mall Apple store in H-Town haven’t been destroyed. I’d much rather see one in the Rice Village or elsewhere closer to Rice, UH, and the Med Center though. Highland Village is okay but it’s still pretty close to the Galleria. At least it’s inner-loop.

Of course Apple can afford to build it… they use slave labor to build their products which they in turn sell to you at a ridiculous premium.
Full Apple department at MicroCenter. Non-mall, inside loop.

strip mall, barely inside the loop.
Besides, Micro Center is the most depressing and hideous computer chain in the country. Have you ever even seen a woman inside a micro center? No, of course you haven’t.

I am suitably chastened Artfox. Admittedly I haven’t even been in the Houston Micro Center in a while, but every time I visit the one here in Minnesota I spend most of my time trying to figure out where anything is while avoiding the condescending yet unhelpful staff.

I’m glad they’re starting from scratch. Their store will probably be the coolest building in HV.
And Feufoma, WTF is there not to like about Apple? They make the best tech products for non-techy people, which is most of us.

MicroCenter looked like hell this weekend- displays missing and ripped up, scattershot merchandise placement, and I still go at least every weekend. The Apple department is always depressing- poorly laid out, bare bones on the displays… it looks like a Ross on a Saturday night. Management needs to get that store whipped back into shape.

it is odd, but i could see from perhaps Apple’s viewpoint that they feel a stand alone store, no matter how close to the galleria, will still serve a different consumer base as a lot of locals refrain from going to the galleria altogether. there’s no shortage of their products anywhere in houston so it’s not like the store is even necessary so they might as well just slap it down in the most affluent area of town and make everyone go there if they want to go to an apple store.

people that are happy buying overpriced electronics will not think twice about burning $4 or more in gas to get to the store and back, just look at their quarterly profits this morning.

I tried to go to Sprinkles a few weeks ago but found it closed. My friend and I explored Crate and Barrel and upon exiting, I saw construction workers disassembling the structure that is in question. Looked really cool, sparks and all, but had no idea that an Apple store was destined for the spot. Thanks for posting!